After a lengthy gap year through 1996, the BBC Video range was kicked off again in January 1997 as part of a ‘regeneration’ of the range alongside books, tapes and other media that generally had matching art style.
Releases were given a little more room to breath, with generally one video out every month or two. They were now presented in their best possible form, and the tradition of editing the final cliffhangers on Hartnell tapes finally ceased. The Keys of Marinus though was missing a few frames in a number of sequences, not discovered until the same team remastered the story again for DVD.
| Date | BBCV | Title | Length* | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 105 | 06/01/1997 | 5821 | The Leisure Hive | 01:28:47 |
| 106 | 03/03/1997 | 6120 | The Awakening Frontios | 00:52:49 01:39:38 |
| 107 | 09/06/1997 | 6183 | The War Machines | 01:40:53 |
| 108 | 18/08/1997 | 5803 | The Happiness Patrol | 01:16:34 |
| 109 | 03/11/1997 | 6229 | The E-Space Trilogy Full Circle State of Decay Warrior’s Gate | 01:35:06 01:36:26 01:38:27 |
| 110 | 13/01/1998 | 6329 | Timelash | 01:32:58 |
| 111 | 23/03/1998 | 6330 | Battlefield | 01:42:08 |
| 112 | 18/05/1998 | 6361 | The Mind of Evil | 01:17:24 01:20:20 |
| 113 | 06/07/1998 | 6536 | Horror of Fang Rock | 01:38:40 |
| 114 | 07/09/1998 | 6567 | Planet of Fire | 01:42:15 |
| 115 | 05/10/1998 | 6609 | The Ark | 01:42:40 |
| 116 | 09/11/1998 | 6387 | The Ice Warriors The Missing Years | 01:59:14 01:00:01 |
| 117 | Nov 1999 | 6610 | Nightmare of Eden | 01:37:11 |
| 118 | Mar 1999 | 6671 | The Keys of Marinus | 01:13:37 01;16:33 |
| 119 | Apr 1999 | 6773 | Revenge of the Cybermen [Episodic] | 01:38:08 |
| 120 | May 1999 | 6672 | The Face of Evil | 01:45:34 |
| 121 | Jul 1999 | 6888 | The Crusade The Space Museum | 02:29:23 |
| 122 | Aug 1999 | 6774 | Terror of the Zygons [Episodic] | 01:38:45 |
| 123 | Sep 1999 | 6889 | The Curse of Fatal Death | 01:03:12 |
| 124 | Nov 1999 | 6927 6928 | Planet of the Daleks Revelation of the Daleks | 02:22:31 01:31:44 |
The new layout was produced by designer Black Sheep, who is also generally assumed to have worked on all the photographic montages for the rest of the range (although the credit only appears on The Leisure Hive). Before the decision, Colin Howard had already created art for The Leisure Hive, The Awakening/Frontios and The Happiness Patrol. The former two were used in full, while the Kandyman was (inexplicably) used as an element in a new photo montage for the latter.
The Awakening/Frontios was across two tapes in a single box (with each tape containing one story) and The Mind of Evil was also in this format. Planet of the Daleks, despite being si episodes, was on a single tape.
Several releases were special in one way or the other:
- The War Machines required significant work to remaster, with clips dropped in from several sources to extend it closer to the original broadcast length (further work would be done for the DVD release to get it up to the correct length). To celebrate this, the tape also opened with a Blue Peter clip and an original BBCtv logo, and ended with restoration credits.
- The E-Space Trilogy featured three stories in separate cases, housed in a cardboard sleeve. The final tape opened with an extended advert for CD-Rom game Destiny of the Doctor, which was advertised as a bonus feature.
- Battlefield‘s second and third episodes were extended.
- The Mind of Evil was presented in monochrome (the DVD would be recoloured), with a short sequence of footage at the end that was recoloured from home video footage in the same way as the 1990s Pertwee colourisations.
- The Ice Warriors was introduced by Frazer Hines and Deborah Watling, and linked with a mini-reconstruction of the missing parts TWO and THREE. It was accompanied by a CD containing the full episodes, and a second tape with a documentary The Missing Years (showcasing all the clips from missing episodes) and, introduced by Hines and Watling, the third part of The Underwater Menace. All of this material was later released on DVD.
- Revenge of the Cybermen and Terror of the Zygons were reissue of the 80s releases, in episodic format at long last. The latter also opened with a clip from Disney Time. Plans were afoot for The Time Warriors and The Talons of Weng-Chiang (the latter accompanied with the Whose Doctor Who documentary) which never came to pass, leaving these as omnibuses only until their DVD releases.
- The Face of Evil opened with a clip from Swap Shop interviewing Louise Jameson.
- The Crusade was linked by newly filmed material featuring William Russell (most of which later appeared on DVD, except the end credits) and on the same tape as The Space Museum, creating a rare six-episode video. They were packaged in a larger box also containing a CD of the missing episodes, postcards and a keyring.
- The Curse of Fatal Death was a standalone release of the 1999 Comic Relief sketch, re-edited from four parts into two (with a new opening) bolstered by a documentary and three previous sketches. A sticker on the front advertised a competition.
- Planet of the Daleks Episode Three was presented in monochome (the DVD would be colourised). Revelation of the Daleks had one minor scene extension, and also had a piece of music by Jimi Hendrix replaced, as rights could not be secured. The two were on separate tapes housed in a tin.
Despite best possible efforts, some visible damage was present in Timelash, resulting in a warning on the sleeve usually reserved for releases of the first three Doctors.
The interiors were used to advertise the range (see info here). The War Machines included an extra fold-out detailing the restoration work, The Curse of Fatal Death one that provided information on the work of Comic Relief, and the two Dalek serials details on the original productions (which would continue a trend until the end of the range).
The tape openings were generally made up of a tracking message, a copyright message, and then the rhombus logo (replaced by the new block logo from The E-Space Trilogy onwards) before going straight into the episodes, with the following exceptions:
- Several tapes had ‘also available’ cards after the BBC logo: The Leisure Hive (Ribos/Stones/Kroll), The Awakening (Green/Android/TVM), The War Machines (Awakening/Leisure), The Happiness Patrol (Peladon/Five:SE), Full Circle (Hive/War Machines/books), State of Decay (Awakening/Happiness/books/audio), Warrior’s Gate (books/TVM/War Machines) and The Keys of Marinus (Ice Warriors/Infinity Doctors/Out of the Darkness).
- The Awakening, The War Machines and The Happiness Patrol opened with a promo film from the Federation Against Copyright Theft (“Pirate Videos? Daylight Robbery” before the tracking message.
- Timelash, Battlefield, The Mind of Evil Tape 1, Horror of Fang Rock and The Ice Warriors included a ‘new dimension’ range trailer after the BBC logo.
- The Mind of Evil, The Keys of Marinus had title cards immediately before the opening credits on both tapes.
- Planet of Fire and The Ark brought back the ’98 videos’ range trailer from the TV Movie VHS to place after the BBC logo.
- The Crusade featured a Macrovision copyright protection warning and a title card after the BBC logo, and Terror of the Zygons also included the Macrovision warning in the same spot.
…several videos then seagued into bonus features before the episodes themselves began. These are detailed further up.
Tapes closed a little more consistently: The Leisure Hive ended as the range had for years: with a rhombus logo and the year of release as a copyright, followed by a copyright message. From The Awakening/Frontios to The Happiness Patrol the format was similar but the copyright year integrated the BBC logo (and The Happiness Patrol was copyrighted 1996 despite being released in 1997). From The E-Space Trilogy onwards was a block logo with a copyright year (Nightmare of Eden was copyrighted 1998 despite being the first 1999 release, and the Daleks tin at the end of 1999 was copyright 2000) followed by a copyright warning. The Terror of the Zygons logo was silent.
Alternate end caption from 
The new BBC block logo was introduced on the labels for The E-Space Trilogy set, although Timelash reverted back to the earlier rhombus logo for reasons unknown.
